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In a recent notable paper, Rose (2004a) finds no evidence that membership in the GATT/WTO increases trade. However, to evaluate accurately the role of the trade organization on trade promotion, only trade in commodities and sectors that are actually under the influence of that organization should be taken into account. Therefore, in this study, we exclude agriculture, textile and oil trade from consideration, as they are not dealt with under GATT/WTO rules; as a result, the benefit of the GATT/WTO's promotional efforts is pronounced, increasing trade by approximately 30% for member countries.gravity model, GATT, WTO, trade promotion, trade liberalization,

This article shows the profit efficiency and its determinants in Korean savings banks in the period 2002-2008 using a three-step estimation procedure: profit efficiency, computed in the second step after the first step Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) estimation, is regressed on the environmental variables in the third step. We found that industry-average profit efficiency dropped in 2004-2005 and quickly rebound in the subsequent years. We also found that unit banks and small banks are more efficient than affiliated banks and large banks. This article then analyses determinants of profit efficiency and presents three findings: (1) interest rate is the most important factor, with a 1% point increase in interest rate leading to a 20% point increase in profit efficiency; (2) profit efficiency declines as bank assets increase, implying that the expansionary strategy is not profit-enhancing unless current technology for financial intermediation changes; and (3) an increase in noncollateral loans lowers profit efficiency, implying that a policy drive for an increase in noncollateral loans requires a priori appropriate credit rating system and transparent accounting practices.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify; margin: 0in 36.1pt 0pt 0.5in; mso-pagination: none;"><span style="color: black; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">In this study, a number of internal and external variables that could affect personal saving are examined using regression to show how they are related to personal saving. The empirical study is performed using the time series data of the U.S. between the years 1950 and 2007. The findings reveal that personal saving is highly dependent on personal income, tax, credit outstanding and status of employment, while dependency ratio, current real estate loan, real interest rate and status of economic performance are indeterminate.<em><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"></span></em></span></span></p>